


Three Times Face and Phanan Made Out and One Time They Didn't

by wired



Category: Star Wars: X-wing Series - Aaron Allston & Michael Stackpole
Genre: M/M, pet bug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-20
Updated: 2010-12-20
Packaged: 2017-10-13 21:30:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/141923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wired/pseuds/wired
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being a series of glimpses into the private romance of a couple snubfighter jocks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three Times Face and Phanan Made Out and One Time They Didn't

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kathalcyon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kathalcyon/gifts).



> The noted character death is a glancing reference to things that happened in canon.

I

Face was an actor, so it wasn't like Phanan was fooling him, but Phanan kept trying, trying not to flinch as Face stroked his face just at the interface of man and machine. No matter what the med droids did, the nerves felt strange and alien. They reported fingers as smears like clay, or sometimes kisses felt like metal. The cyborg parts were actually less unnerving - at least they were predictable.

Face stopped at last and took his wingman's face in both hands, cupping him as gently as an armed mine. The kiss was also gentle, a damaged snubfighter coming slowly and gingerly into the launch deck. Phanan caught his breath in the wonder of being treated gently. Who was he, half a man, to be valued by this bright-burning beauty, subject of half the crushes in the empire?

Phanan reached out with his organic hand and unfastened Face's flightsuit, his fingers trailing down the line of the sealer. The shirt underneath was non-regulation, a clinging knit, almost sheer with age and laundering. His palm pressed the shirt and he felt the rise of Face's chest as his breath hitched.

They hadn't said anything as they wandered back to their shared room. They often left the rec room together, and they never touched in the halls and passageways. It was just that sometimes Face would come through the door and seal it behind him, and lean back against it, and then Phanan knew it was ok to touch him tonight, that tonight, without words, they would curl and cut around and through each other's arms, accelerating into each other.

Phanan's left hip had been replaced early on, and the joint sometimes caught a little, especially on cold postings. That made it even easier for Face to leg sweep him onto the bed and straddle his hips.

II

It was the damn Glass Prowler cage that got in the way. Phanan was kissing Face with enthusiasm when he went to sit up and get a better angle. He hit the corner of the containment unit and collapsed half across Face. Face was trying to see if Phanan was hurt or bleeding, and the bug was skittering around madly, and if he had to call a medic, they might get laughed at forever. But after a long, long moment, Phanan reached around to touch the back of his head.

"No problem, it hit one of the cyborg parts. No organic damage."

He rolled off a little and opened the containment unit. He set the stilted animal on his chest and crooned to it, reassuring it that it had not been frightened on purpose. Face got over his panic enough to set his hand on Phanan's lower abdomen, a fair way from the bug. He liked watching Phanan coo over the damn thing, the way his body relaxed and softened, but that didn't mean he wanted the thing accidentally touching him.

Once the bug had been restored to its containment unit, Phanan rolled out from under Face's hand and dropped out of the bunk onto the friction matting.

"Care to join me in more spacious quarters?" he invited, spreading his arms wide. Face quirked his eyebrow and rolled on top of of him, causing Phanan to oof heavily.

"I thought you'd never ask."

III

There was no denying that the view was spectacular. The viewport showed the gas moon under Night Caller, and the previous owners had gone in for the swanky liquid lounges that military ships in the Alliance were somehow under-supplied with. They were slouched down watching the moon spin beneath them, and from where he was sitting, Face could only see the human side of Phanan’s face, what he referred to as ‘the factory original parts’. They knew that anyone could walk past and see them necking, but the dark and the view and the lounge combined to make them care less about discovery.

It wasn’t that their teammates didn’t have their own little romances brewing, but Face had grown up in a media whirlwind and had a bone-deep objection to other people knowing his business, his love life, or even his tastes in lovers. He didn’t want to share the way he felt about Phanan with anyone on the team, or the universe. It was their own bubble, and tonight it encapsulated the two of them and their view.

Face leaned against Phanan’s shoulder, nestling against the flight suit that smelled of lubricating agents and ozone and the smell of a man who had worked all day. He tipped his face up a little more so that he could press a kiss against the angle of neck that showed corded tension, even now. He kissed up the line of knots to that spot behind the ear. Phanan leaned into him, trusting with his weight. By unspoken signal, they twisted so they could face each other and tangled their legs together. The lounge shifted under them and the planet spun, and they fell into the gravity well of each other.

IV

Jesmin was dead, Grinder was dead, Falynn was dead, and Phanan was just out of the med unit. It hurt so much to think about everything that they could have or should have done, but it's all they could see. It was a good thing each of them had the same woes, or they'd be unbearable companions.

Phanan was uncomfortably taped up with the last remnants of the med unit, and was sitting propped in the corner of his bunk. Face crawled across the bed, between Phanan's splayed legs, and leaned his forehead against Phanan. They stayed that way, just forehead to forehead, breathing and listening, for a very long time.

Face felt Phanan twitch a little, the jerk of a man falling asleep, and he pulled back. Phanan's injuries and exhaustion had combined to knock him out. Backing up carefully, Face disentangled himself and stood at the edge of the bunk, thinking about all the things that needed doing, all the cleanup that was still waiting for him.

Then he crawled cautiously into the bunk, put his head on Phanan's thigh, and curled up in a tight little ball in the half-bunk still available. He fell asleep with a hand curled around Phanan's knee, and never felt Phanan's hand rest on his shoulder, later that night.


End file.
